ACORN takes action against workers videotaped by conservative activists

ACORN officials in San Diego County and San Bernardino have taken action against workers who answered questions about starting a prostitution business while being secretly videotaped by conservative activists.

In National City near San Diego, an ACORN worker was fired for "unacceptable conduct" for answering questions by the activists, who posed as a prostitute and a pimp. 

Spokesman David Lagstein made the announcement just hours after saying no action would be taken against the organizer, Juan Carlos Vera.  Still,  Lagstein referred to the two activists who came to the National City office as "unscrupulous partisan videographers."

On Thursday, the chairman of the Republican Party in San Diego County and a Republican member of the County Board of Supervisors joined Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in calling for an investigation of ACORN.

GOP Chairman Tony Krvaric and Supervisor Bill Horn said they were particularly suspicious of the group's voter registration efforts in a local Assembly race and a San Diego City Council race, both won by Democrats.

The undercover video shot at the ACORN office in National City purports to show the worker willing to help someone interested in setting up a prostitution ring, possibly with girls from Tijuana. The video has been  shown on commentator Sean Hannity's Fox News program.

"Coverage by the national media has put a black mark on our region and we have an obligation to find the truth," Horn said. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista) has introduced a motion in Congress calling for the government to deny all federal funding to ACORN.

Meanwhile, an second videotape showed an ACORN worker in San Bernardino offering advice on how to set up prostitution businesses. 

That worker has been suspended.

Conservative activists James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles posed as a pimp and a prostitute, respectively, in a hidden-camera video released Tuesday that depicts a woman who O’Keefe says is an ACORN worker in San Bernardino saying she could show them “how not to get caught.” On the video, which is edited, she also discusses allegedly killing her ex-husband and says she “laid some groundwork” beforehand by going to domestic violence shelters and saying she was abused.

But Christina Spach, the supervisor of the ACORN office in San Bernardino, told the San Bernardino Sun that the woman on the tape knew the pair were joking but went along with it in part because she was alone in the office and was concerned for her safety. "Just to be clear, ACORN is not in the prostitution business," Spach told the Sun. "She was in an office all by herself. She felt unsafe in their company."

The worker, Tresa Kaelke, told the Washington Post: "I thought from the very beginning it was a joke."

ACORN called on the activists to release the full tape, but declined to make the worker on the tape available to speak with reporters. 

O’Keefe and Giles have previously released similar videos in Baltimore, Washington and New York that have appeared on websites and Fox News. In a letter to state Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown released to reporters, Schwarzenegger, a Republican, said the reports “concerned me greatly."

Brown spokesman Scott Gerber said in a statement that his office would review the video, "and if we think there's any wrongdoing, we'll look into it or refer it to the local" district attorney. The U.S. Senate voted Monday to block federal housing grants to the group, which has also come under fire in voter registration fraud cases, particularly during last year’s presidential campaign.The group registers voters for Democrats.

--Tony Perry in San Diego and Shelby Grad

Comments

[Belinda Gomez]

"unscrupulous partisan videographers."

Heaven forfend! For an outfit that wanted to pay less than minimum wage here in CA, and suffered a near $1 mil embezzlement by the founder's brother (who was never prosecuted), ACORN would have rather bigger problems that some low-level staffers who advice people how to cheat on their taxes.

That the San Bernardino staff member thought O'Keefe and Giles were jokers is to her semi-credit, but why didn't she just kick them out, rather than gas on? She's not exactly the poster girl for responsible management.

[William R. Bauer]

Unless the unedited tapes are released, these accusations have zero credibility. The perps who made the tapes are well-known right wing nut cases, and little that they produce can be believed, Shame on the Congress for taking them the least bit seriously.

[Master Blaster]

The speed our congress moved to close down this agency on this trumped charge shows how they can move when it suits them. Now let them move on our unemployment problems or failing to get out a budget on time. The stench of Carl Rove is all over this planned and timed plot to distract us from Obamas speach for health care. If it proves that this is a real problem so be it but the very speed of this stopping of funding for a agency of over 40 years of great service to poor and minority people is a classic rush to judgment.

[Master Blaster]

Sorry I mis-typed I meant Karl Rove.

[Hidenout]

Well, at the least, I wonder how the federal government feels about giving money to an organization that tells it's customers how to cheat the federal government? 83-7.

I wonder how the taxpayer feels? Oddly, mixed.

Some can blame it on a "republican witch hunt", yet 10 states are investigating this organization for felonies committed by the higher ups.

Are they a criminal enterprise? No, in my opinion. But they sure as heck hire a lot of criminals. Makes you wonder.

[Paul Cardinal]

Oh please, Acorn is so incredibly corrupt and it takes a 20-year-old- girl and a 25-year-old guy to STING them where it hurts. Touchee to all the media outlets that are so incredibly uncomfortable out this. 'IT IS THE STINGERS WHO ARE EVIL!" RIGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHT!

Acorn throws their people under the bus, but don't fret, they have millions more like them to talk their radical lines.

What a disgrace to America

[Dr. M. Hoffman]

The authors should be more diligent in their choice of words ("... the group, which also come under fire in voter registration fraud cases, particularly during last year’s presidential campaign.")

In the last presidential campaign, ACORN was the victim of fraud, not the perpetrator. ACORN reported to authorities that some of its temporary workers had turned in false registrations with names such as Mickey Mouse with intent to get extra money from ACORN. It was only the right wing smear machine that somehow contorted this story into one where ACORN was trying to perpetrate voter fraud. The absurdity of such is obvious from the fact that no one name Mickey Mouse was ever going to actually show up and cast a vote!

This article's authors however have now bought into and perpetrated the right wing smear fiction.

[Bruce W]

Well well, the mighty L.A. Times FINALLY deigned to publish (reluctantly, I'm SURE) a story about ACORN. (After some people had known about it for almost TWO WEEKS). Fascinating some of the comments so far, have attacked the "messengers"- written by Times staffers, perhaps? Big Media got scooped. An orginization rife with corruption for decades is finally going to face justice. Of course Big Media didn't want to cover it, ACORN is part of the Democrat Party Machine!

Come on now, yes we know it was a false premise but the point is, if you are sitting in your office, and these people come in and ask advice regarding illegal activity including the purported ABUSE OF CHILDREN, are you going to "play along knowing they were kidding," or are you going to tell them, oh, could you wait here a minute?" And GO CALL THE POLICE? Hello?

[pedro]

Hopefully more video's are RELEASED:) For sure everything will be an DOMINO EFFECT HMM HMMM.

[James Wilson]

Gee, glad to see that the Times finally decided to cover the ACORN debacle. It only took the Times eight days after the tapes were first released to publish anything regarding ACORN. As far as the tapes not having any credibility, who are you kidding? If ACORN has fired the workers involved and launched their own investigation, then the tapes must be credible. Now the only question that needs to be asked is if President Obama is going to seek a refund of the $800,000 that his campaign paid to ACORN last year to enlist voters...of which many were fraudulent.

[Bill Bilson]

To those who are screaming for the unedited tapes to be made available, well, they have been. They actually show a lot worse than the edited tapes do but time constraints won't allow the media to play the unedited video. It sad that the people who are calling "unfair entrapment" with regard to the sting are completely disregarding the criminality on display here.

[ferenc]

this acorn is full of riffraff, of all colors and the taxpayers support them? what a fu country we live in.oh by the way obama was one of their organizers. time for change, now.right wing nuts, left wing commies, GO AT IT NOW.

[greg d]

Why does the Times refer to O'Keefe and Giles as "conservative activists" when it does not call Acorn a liberal activists organization? It seems o'Keefe and Giles are just invesigative reporters exposing a good story, like Woodard and Bernstein did. Did you huys forget how?

[Rodger]

Yea, I'd be afraid of those kids if I were them too. Of course, if you saw the video, you know the lady (and I use the term loosely) was not alone. There were at least two males there with her. Both bigger than the two kids put together.

[WB]

Glad to see the LA Times report this. These 2 young folks were able to expose the most vile corruption by this highly partisan group. Acorn is done !!!

[PeterPatnter]

ACORN is a very worthwhile national organization that does a lot of good in California and elsewhere.

One of the workers has explained that she was worried about violence from the "sting" pair. That explanation is completely plausible, as is (in fact) the likelihood of actual violence.

The worst thing that can be said of ACORN here is that its leaders failed to foresee the possibility of clients asking for help with illegal activities.

The ACORN leadership should have (and now undoubtedly will) train workers to tell such clients -- whether real or bogus clients -- that the activities sound illegal and of course the organization can't facilitate anything that is likely to be illegal.

Meanwhile, private "sting" activities are themselves probably illegal. ACORN's corrective reaction should include taping entrance interviews (with advance notice, of course) to catch "stingers" in their own misbehavior -- and see to it that the stingers meet the police on the way out -- thereby turning the tables on antiACORN right-wing hoodlums.

Let them try to explain to the fuzz that it was "only a sting, man."

If a client asks whether the tape, and the client's identity, will be kept confidential, the ACORN worker should answer that it will be -- provided that no illegal activity is involved in the client's plans.

[R. Ramirez]

I would hope a full investigation follows this especially would love to see the full unedited tapes like the ones where the fake pimp was shown the door at many more offices than were shown on Faux News! Go to democracynow.org and see the response from the head of Acorn on yesterday mornings show something the Liberal Biased Media will not show you! As for voter fraud how many people in the Republican paid voter registration campaigns were convicted of falsifying registration forms and changing them from Democratic to Republican! Those voter registration forms that Acorn turned that were false were in special bundles and noted to be suspicious by guess who? Acorn them selves once you have a form filled out you have to turn it in whether it is true or false Acorn followed the law and alerted the registrar of there concerns on mickey mouses registration that is what is left off of the MSM Liberal biased reporting on the whole Acorn thing!

[Dallas]

It's about time your liberal paper printed this story! It's been all oer the web for days now and you finally get up the nerve to print it.

[Matt]

Lets not forget people, if you criticize ACORN your racist!!